Poetry for the end of the year

Winning
Down the Road 
​As Ususal
At the End 

by Julie Carpenter 

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Winning
 
To win the game
You must work with him
 
 
Become hollow before it starts
Scrape out your own insides
It will be less painful to do it now
 
Now he can wear your skin
Like a suit
Stretched and reshaped 
 
The very little that is left of you
Is pushed to the edges
The boundary,  your own skin
 
And yet…
Your existence still
stains the exterior, a thin coat of paint
 
His lips must stop at yours
His sense of touch
Must end inside your fingertips
 
The victory of inhabitation is finite
The triumph smaller than you would have thought
The trivial price of playing the game

Down the road
 
There’s a dead puppy
One of those we saw
Outside Melvin’s trailer
Honey-colored, floppy ears?
 
Remember?
Just two days ago, I said
Those pups are doomed
Surely going to get run over
 
Buzzards already there
Starting to pick at it
The live pups still out on the road
By Melvin’s
 
Melvin shrugged 
When I told him.
One less pup to feed.
He ought not have a dog.
 
There’s satisfaction, you said
In being right.
None for me, I replied
Maybe for the buzzards

As Usual

I knew I was dying,
Tousled the children’s hair 
Told them not to cry.

Called my sister for a ride
To the cemetery
Too weak to drive myself.

Called you frantically,
Invited you to meet me
But you were late 
As usual

I sat on the grass 
Legs dangling over cold, dark pit
Breathing in damp earth

Grass grew through my fingers.
Slipping into skin and bone.
Decomposed. Too tired to wait.

But I held on, dizzy
Until you arrived
Breathless, apologetic, late
As usual

Then you kissed me.
The last kiss
Smelled of dirt
Tickled my lip like the grass

Growing through my hand
Postponing death a few more minutes,
Waiting for you
As usual


At the End
 
We were finally certain
 
When the baleful dragon’s eye
Settled between the hills
 
Leaking red blood and molten gold
Onto the bare trees
 
The sensible closed their eyes
And died at once
 
The rest of us
Refusing to look away
Are dying still

Bio:
Julie Carpenter is the creator of the Sacred Chickens website and Author of Things Get Weird in Whistlestop. She is dedicated to telling stories and making sure that indie writers and publishers have a way to be heard.  She uses narrative, her own and others’, to help interpret the world. She has a Master of Professional Writing from the University of Memphis, with an emphasis in Composition Theory. She wants to bend reality one story at a time.  Julie’s work has appeared in Fiction on the Web and will be included The New Guard. She is currently working on a novel and starting a podcast where people can tell her about their weird ideas.

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